Hulu and Netflix in Bidding War for Arrested Development

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The Bluths are coming back, but who will be the one to air the new Arrested Development season?

By Eric Goldman

As much as we're all scared to get too excited about this Arrested Development revival, lest the rug get pulled out from under us, the chances for it to become a reality are looking better, as Hulu is now in a bidding war with Netflix to be the exclusive distributor for the one-off new season of the series. Vulture reported the story, revealing that Hulu has entered the fray after hearing the news (and all of the hoopla surrounding it) earlier this week about the show returning, and that Netflix and Showtime were both among those in talks with Arrested's co-producer, 20th Century Fox Television.

As Vulture notes, Arrested Development has had a strong afterlife on DVD and online, making it very appealing to Netflix and Hulu – and 20th tells Vulture that Hulu has had 100 million streaming impressions from Arrested episodes and clips and outtakes in the past three years, despite not having exclusive rights to the series. Hulu and Netflix both see new Arrested Development episodes as a big lure, with Netflix also looking to get into more original content and to draw people back in after bad press (and lost subscribers) over their recent price hikes.

Despite 20th Century Fox producing Arrested Development, Vulture says it's unlikely for the new episodes to end up on FOX or corporate sibling FX for a variety of reasons, including the fact that neither channel would want to spend the promotional money (and take up a timeslot) for a series that is only intended for one, limited-run season.

However, costs will be held in check both by not having the full cast in every episode (as the plan is for each episode to focus on a different character) and by splitting the production cost, such as building sets, between the series and the Arrested Development movie, which will be shot back-to-back.